


doesn't he always

by ghost_milk



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Gay Panic, M/M, Mutual Pining, Recreational Drug Use, embarrassed kissing, tender looks and scared of feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-16
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:07:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22273036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghost_milk/pseuds/ghost_milk
Summary: “When did you know?” Eddie asks cautiously.Richie doesn’t have a fast answer because he knows that he has always known it.“When you broke your arm,” Richie says, though he only just decided it to be true.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 20
Kudos: 306





	doesn't he always

Richie thinks that Eddie’s eyes always look kind of wet in a way that makes it seem like he is either about to cry or just finished up crying. Not exactly teary like allergies, just dewey like a tired kid past nap time. 

His eyes are honest in a way that makes it feel like everyone else is a worse person in comparison. Like no one in the world could ever be so deeply genuine as Edward F. Kaspbrak. He is so plainly authentic that it makes Richie want to jam his hands into his pockets so deep he could make them come out by his ankles.

Eddie’s eyes even remain somehow clear and innocent when his mouth is saying something so foul it puts Richie’s own to shame. Eventually, Richie had gotten used to the way it made his throat hurt and his hands go numb whenever Eddie looked at him. He knew what it all meant by the time he was thirteen and he knows even better now that he’s eighteen.

It’s an hour past the Derry curfew and the sun is just past down at the quarry. The rest of the losers are gone and just Richie and Eddie are left.

And isn’t it always.

Eddie is facing the water and only the back of his head is visible from Richie’s lazy stretch in the dirt. Richie is watching Eddie and Eddie isn’t watching anything while he tugs up fistfulls of grass and drops them onto Richie’s chest. The blades are scratchy through the thin cotton of his t-shirt.

It is always unusual when Eddie breaks the silence between them first, and it startles Richie when he does so tonight. 

“Rich, do you ever think that…” his voice trails off instead of finishing and Richie doesn’t have the slightest clue about how the sentence might end. Probably because he is more occupied thinking about the goosebumps on Eddie’s obviously cold legs sticking out of his shorts. If he had a jacket he might try to give it to Eddie, but he doesn’t so he briefly, absurdly, considers giving him his own pants. 

Eddie is quiet for just long enough that Richie prompts him with a small curious sound in the back of his throat.

Eddie sighs. “I just don’t want to go home,” his words are clipped and direct and Richie sits up, knocking the small heap of grass back to the dirt. 

“Eds,” Richie tries to make his voice sound as gentle as possible, but he knows a major side effect of being him is that everything that comes out of his mouth sounds kind of shitty.

Eddie’s eyes turn to Richie’s, and Richie sees the stress of someone ten times their age. He thinks that Eddie kind of looks like he’s on death row and that sucks to think about, and it sucks that there is nothing Richie can do to help.

Mrs. Kaspbrak doesn’t let him sleep over anymore. Not with what people say about him.

Knowing this, he says, “I’ll go home for you instead, Eddie,” with the ugly grin reserved for the particular brand of joke that’s about to come out. “We’ll just switch places. I’m sure your mom-”

“Richie,” he snaps and cuts off the end of what was surely going to be a great joke. As if Richie ever knew what was going to come out of his dumb mouth literally any time he opened it. 

“You are so god damn unbelieveable aren’t you running out of stupid god damn mom jokes at this point its been like a fucking decade you are so fucking mouthy it’s unbelievable.” Eddie polishes off the ridicule with a lame punch to Richie’s shoulder that feels how he thinks it might feel to be kissed.

“Sorry,” Richie says, and he means it. Not for the jokes, but for everything else. 

“Yeah,” Eddie answers. He knows.

To be honest, Eddie scares the ever-living shit out of him. Sometimes the fear feels too real, like a substance he’s forced to hold in his mouth. A substance that’s only purpose is to mix with every lie he’s ever told about just how much he likes Eddie into a shitty flavored smoothie of self hatred. As impossible to swallow as it is to spit out.

When his brain starts thinking about Eddie too much he has to start sporadically attacking his thoughts the same way he does when he gets an inopportune boner. Grandmas and puppies and synagogue — anything to get his mind off of Eddie’s eyes or legs or mouth and the terror and panic that comes soon after.

“Eds do you ever get a memory stuck in your head like a song?” he asks. He’s thinking of the afternoon the other losers asked about his fears. He’s thinking of the time in his bedroom at three in the morning when Stanley asked him if he’d ever had a crush on someone. 

He’s thinking about Eddie dunking his head under the water at the quarry. 

He’s thinking about Eddie sitting across from him right now in the dirt and looking at his mouth. 

Self conscious, he licks his lips and watches as Eddie’s eyes dart back up to his own.

“Sometimes,” Eddie says. “Why?”

“I don’t know,” Richie says and he knows Eddie knows it’s a lie. “I think I just miss being a kid.” Richie decides he can’t look at Eddie anymore and starts pulling at the loose strings that are asking to be pulled out of the hole in his jeans.

“You still are a kid,” Eddie says and he says it like he believes it.

The dark around them is getting darker and Richies asks Eddie if he can walk him home.

“My mom might come unglued if she sees you walk me home again,” he says, frustrated and he rubs at his face. “I’m delicate, remember.” 

Richies sighs because yeah, he remembers. Not only does he remember Mrs. Kaspbrak’s nasty nasal tone calling Eddie delicate in front of the losers on multiple occasions, he remembers running into her at the drug store and having her pull him aside just to tell him that Eddie was happy and healthy and she would do anything to keep him that way. 

_Disease-free,_ she said. 

_Away from you,_ she said.

He didn’t know what she meant by that until he was sixteen. For fuck’s sake. 

He remembers crying to Bev about it too, lying in her bed and smearing snot on her sleeve, knowing that she knew exactly how cutting Mrs. K’s words had the ability to be. 

“Yeah,” he says. “I remember.”

“I can walk you home, though,” he says. His eyes are so... his eyes are _so._ He doesn’t even know what they are just that they _are_ , and he feels fucked. Fucked like he would live inside of Eddie’s clothes just to touch his skin fucked. 

_I can walk you home, though,_ he says. Like it’s that easy.

“Yeah,” he says again. “Okay.” 

And he does.

-

The thing about Eddie is that he always seems to be doing things that surprise everyone around him. Everyone that isn’t Richie. Even the other losers were surprised when they learned that Eddie not only likes running but that he likes cross country. He prefers it to the treadmill, and he prefers it to track. 

He prefers the dirtiest running.

But Richie gets it. It’s maybe a bit hard to visualize someone as particular as Eddie running through the woods and the mud and the grime. But if anyone would just think about Eddie for more than ten seconds they could see what he sees. 

And Richie knows a thing or two about thinking about Eddie. 

Eddie is the most rebellious mother fucker Richie has ever known. It is a quiet and consistent rebellion that can only be found in the way he flushes his prescriptions and breaks an arm or leg every single summer, but it’s the most honest form of rebellion Richie has ever seen.

The same rebellion that probably makes trekking through the muddy woods packed with other sweaty bodies so enticing. 

The fact that his mother hates the sport and all the dangers that it imposes on Eddie is just a bonus. It gives Eddie someplace to be that she will not. 

And holy shit, is Eddie fast. 

Richie’s arms are pressed into the wire mesh on the top rail of a chain link fence waiting to see Eddie finish his meet. It’s pouring out, but Saturday morning meets are Eddie’s favorite and he’s always in a good mood so Richie wouldn’t be anywhere else in the world.

Bill comes sometimes too, like today, because Richie thinks that Bill is probably Eddie’s best friend. If it weren’t for Richie. Of course, Richie is Stan’s best friend, if it weren’t for Bill. 

Richie’s bike is pressed against his hip. It’s the same bike he rode as a kid, awkwardly small for his now adult sized limbs but he never bothered with buying a car, the damn town was so small and no car meant more money. More money to leave as soon as possible with. 

He and Bill are not talking, just excitedly watching the mouth of the woods in the rain, waiting to see Eddie emerge from the mud and sludge. Bill lets out a loud _whoop_ when he finally sees Eddie sloshing through in first place. Eddie is always first.

Richie cheers too. There is mud roped around Eddie’s legs with cuts of skin peeking through from rivulets of rain water and his shorts are soaked completely through and stuck to his skin just _so_. Richie thinks about how uncomfortable it is to ride a bike with a half chub, but he warms up to the idea fast because he knows that Eddie’s ass is going to be pressed into the front handlebars of his bike later.

As shitty and disgusting as it makes him feel it’s also a non-issue. He’s used to it.

Eddie's legs are tearing up the earth under him. The crowd of parents, Richie, and Bill whoop and holler as he runs the final stretch.

Eddie has a grin that takes up his whole face. 

"Hell yeah Eds!" Richie cups his hands around his mouth to yell out from his side of the fence. Eddie runs through the finish point and keeps going. He slows to a jog, to a walk, and then plants his hands to his knees to breathe exactly the way he has mentioned he shouldn’t do after running. 

Eddie catches a bottle of water from the coach who is also whooping in excitement at his great time, and he chugs some of it before making his way over to the fence. His face is rosey and soaked with sweat and rain. He’s walking awkwardly and he calls out that his shorts are sticking to his ass and he can’t wait to take a fucking shower.

“You’re so fast, Eddie,” Bill says in astonishment and not for the first time. Eddie is really, so fucking fast. Richie ran with him once when he asked and he came to the conclusion that running was only good for when that dumb fucker Pennywise is at the other end of a sewer tunnel. 

Eddie splashes some water from the bottle at Richie, but is looking at Bill when he says that he has to take a cool down jog. 

“You’re insane,” Richie says. 

"Absolutely insane," Bill confirms through his stutter. 

“It’s better for me if I do,” Eddie says. “Even if I don’t really want to.” 

Before he can run off Riches asks, "We’re still doing movies after this right?" even though he knows that they are. It’s a weird sort of jealousy, but he probably said it just to hear Eddie say yes in front of Bill. 

Eds gives him a stink eye and says "Yeah, asshole. That was the plan." 

Richie smiles and reaches out and touches his shoulder and although he knows why, he’s not entirely sure why. 

Eddie slaps at his hand and takes off.

“What movie are you going to see?” Bill asks, and Richie tells him.

-

“I have lice,” Eddie declares.

Richie barely looks up when Eddie slams the door to his bedroom and walks in like he owns the place. He tosses a bag with something solid in it that hits him in the shoulder. 

“Fuck off,” he says. “No you don’t.”

“I do,” he pulls at his hair as he says it. “I can feel them, I know it. I fell at practice right in the mud, and Alexander helped me up. He’s nice, but his sister had lice last week and now I have lice. I have _lice_ Richie.”

He falls onto Richie’s bed, with his socks landing on the pillows. 

“Sure man” Richie says, “You have lice and you come to my house and lay on my bed. Uh, asshole?” 

“Fuck, Rich,” Eddie jumps up as he says this. “Fuck man, you’re going to get lice.” 

Richie stands and grabs Eddie by his hair. He scrunches his face up and makes a circle with his fingers to mimic a monocle in front of his eyes. 

“Ow, dickwad,” Eddie says. “You definitely have lice now, fucker.”

“Looks like…” Richie gives his hair an honest once over. “No, no bugs here, Captain.”

“I need you to wash my hair,” Eddie says. 

“What? Why?” Richie lets go like Eddie’s hot enough to burn him. 

“Because, asshole are you even here? I have lice.” Eddie frowns. 

Richie gives him a long look. “Wash your own hair, man,” he says. 

“I can’t,” Eddie rolls his eyes like he’s explaining it to himself as much as he’s explaining to Richie “Like, even if I don’t have lice, Rich, please help me wash my hair. If I do it alone I’ll just get paranoid that I still have lice I just need you to do this for me.” His tone says that he thinks it’s stupid, but he really sounds panicked. “I guess I could have Stan do-” 

“Yeah,” Richie interrupts, and his mouth feels like there’s a rag stuffed down his throat. “No, it’s fine,” he says with his hands up surrendered. “I got you, man.” 

“Thanks, Rich.” Eddie looks like he wants to sit down but doesn’t want to infect anything. 

Richie just hums and retrieves the bag from the bed. 

“You should wash yours too,” Eddie says. “Now that I’ve been in here.” 

“Okay, Eds,” he says even though he doesn’t really want to. He makes a show of also pulling his blankets up and dropping them over the banister where they land somewhat near the washing machine below. Eddie is carefully watching the whole time, following just a few steps behind. 

“I just washed those,” he says matter of factly. “My dad’s gonna think I’m jerking off too much.” 

Eddie scoffs like he’s offended, like he hasn’t told Richie in the past about how he only jacks off in the shower so his sheets don’t get dirty. 

When they’re back in his room he drags his repurposed kitchen-turned-desk chair over to the bed. He points at it for Eddie to sit in, and he seats himself directly across on his freshly bare mattress. 

Richie tears open the packaging to the shampoo and Eddie catches it when he tries to toss it on the floor. 

“Read it first,” he says. The _asshole_ part is implied. He twists it around and reads the instructions clearly and concisely to Richie. 

Richie stands up and pours a palmful into his hand. “So we wash our hair, got it.”

“Get my whole head, Rich,” Eddie says, and Richie _hmms._

Richie doesn’t know if he should be looking at Eddie’s face or just his hair or just his own hands for this whole ordeal. He’s not sure any other boys have to go through the process of lice shampooing the vessel of all of their wet dreams so the protocol is kind of lost on him. 

Richie scrubs the shampoo into Eddie’s scalp and takes care in pulling it through to the ends. Eddie is frowning the whole time like he wants to apologize, which is stupid. 

“It won’t hurt, Eds, it’s just shampoo,” Richie says. 

“I’m sorry,” Eddie says back. “I don’t mean to be so-” 

“You’re not,” Richie interrupts. “I mean you are, but you’re not. Don’t worry about it.” He says this and slaps his palm gently to the top of Eddie’s head. 

Richie focuses as he makes sure he gets full coverage down to the back of his neck and all the hairs that curl up from sweat. 

“Ten minutes,” Eddie says. 

“Ten _full_ minutes,” Richie clarifies and checks the clock on his desk. Eddie is already adding a timer to the watch on his wrist. 

Richie pours the shampoo into his hands again to run through his own hair before Eddie has the opportunity to ask if he needs help. He can see Eddie looking up at him in the reflection of his mirror with his big dumb eyes that look innocent all the god damn time and Richie kind of wants to die. 

Just a little. 

“Set one for me too,” Richie says, though he’s only going to be about three minutes behind. It seems he didn’t even have to ask, as Eddie was already doing so. 

He shapes his hair into an ugly wet mohawk that sops and sags and he sits back down, cross-legged.

They sit in only semi-awkward silence as the lice shampoo eats at their scalps, killing the phantom lice. 

Eddie has a pout on his mouth and Richie resists the urge to throw himself backward to look at the ceiling instead of Eddie’s fucking face. Neither of them seem to be in the mood to hurl insults at each other today. The vulnerability is suffocating. 

When the timer goes off, it occurs to Richie that he doesn’t know if Eddie wants to take a shower to get it out. He kind of just stares at Eddie who kind of just stares back at him. There’s only one bathroom in the house, though he supposes that he could wash his own in the kitchen sink. 

He feels stupid asking so he doesn’t.

They both walk dumbly to the bathroom down the hall. Eddie walks right in and kneels in front of the tub. He turns the hot water handle and water gushes out of the faucet. He keeps his hand under it to feel as it warms up to a suitable temperature.

Richie is stuck at the doorway, about to excuse himself to go use the kitchen sink when Eddie says “I’m gonna need your help.” 

Richie feels paralyzed. Eddie’s twisted around to look at him still standing in the doorway. “I want to make sure I get it all,” Eddie clarifies. 

Richie finally crosses the threshold into the bathroom and he closes the door behind him. He locks it too, because he doesn’t want anyone to see what they’re doing. Even if he knows no one is home. It feels like they’re doing something they shouldn’t be.

“How?” Richie asks awkwardly. The toilet is close enough to the tub that Eddie is already at a pretty weird angle just to get his hair close to the running water. 

“However works,” Eddie snaps, and Richie takes the two steps across the tile to be by his side. His hands don’t feel connected to his body as he reaches out to guide Eddie’s head under the water. He feels like he’s going to fall into the tub if he stays bent and crooked like this so he carefully lifts his leg over the arch of Eddie’s back. 

He can feel his calf touching Eddie’s hip, skin pressing into the buckle of the fanny pack he’s wearing. The admittedly slight contact is enough to make him feel like he’s on fire, but he keeps still so that he can push his hair around and get the suds out. 

“You good?” He asks loudly, over the gush as it splashes back into Eddie’s face. 

When Eddie nods Richie can feel the motion of it between his legs and he hopes to god that his horny teenage dick will stay put and flaccid in his briefs. 

He thinks he’s got it all, but Eddie’s hair is soft and sticking to his neck so he pushes it around again, just to make sure. A beeping sounds from where Eddie’s hands are braced on the floor, and Richie pulls his hands away so that Eddie can lean back and turn it off. 

“Is it all out?” Eddie asks.

“Yep,” Richie says. “You’re squeaky clean.” He reaches to the rack and pulls off a clean, dry towel, still gracelessly straddling Eddie. 

“Good,” Eddie says, “Now switch with me.” 

Richie drops the towel over Eddie’s wet head and scrubs him dry. 

“Uh,” he stammers, still nervous at the thought of Eddie touching him, though he has no problem touching Eddie.

Richie drops the towel to the floor and shakes the nerves out of his hands.

“Okay,” he says. 

“Move, asshole,” Eddie says and reaches back to slap at the leg that is still firmly placed against him.

“Sorry,” Richie says, and he thinks his voice is coming from at least a mile away. 

“Come on,” Eddie says again, and Richie carefully lifts his leg back over, careful to not step completely into the toilet. 

As he gets on his knees in front of Eddie he tries his damnedest to not think about the fact that he is getting on his knees in front of Eddie. 

He presses his chest uncomfortably into the edge of the tub, and lets Eddie waterboard him and the lice he doesn’t have. 

He feels Eddie take the same position as he did, legs around him, but Eddie’s a hell of a lot shorter and a hell of a lot closer. Richie swallows and lets the water run over his face and into his nose. He can feel drips from Eddie’s still damp hair land on the back of his neck. 

His hands are solid and confident in what they are doing. He scratches at Richie’s scalp with his fingernails too and Richie feels goosebumps cover his body down to his toes. His throat feels tight like he’s about to make an embarrassing sound from how good it feels. 

He holds it together until Eddie deems him fit enough to stop, and turns the water off. Richie stiffly stays where he is until he feels the scratchy cotton of the towel fall over his head. Eddie rubs the towel into his curls for him and he waits for him to step away before trying to stand up. 

“Thanks,” he says and he feels his voice jump up a pitch and he can’t get out of the bathroom fast enough. 

Eddie interrupts his speedy getaway with his voice only just loud enough to be heard, “Richie,” he says. 

Richie’s theatrics ruin his overly casual lean onto the sink and he asks “Uh, yeah, Eds?”

“Don’t-” Eddie starts. “Sorry,” he says instead. “Sorry I’m like this.” 

That doesn’t seem right. 

“The fuck? Like what?”

Eddie gives him a look like he’d rather eat his own socks than tell him what. 

Richie stays leaning against the sink even as all of his limbs scream at him to be touching Eddie. It’s not the time or place. 

“Like this,” he says poignantly gesturing at the suds that are still in the drain. He directs the gesture to Richie’s face. “Like that.” 

“Eddie, it’s fine,” Richie says. He doesn’t say that if it’s important to Eddie it’s important to him. Maybe Eddie knows that.

Eddie looks at him for a long time and heaves a sigh as he pushes his wet hair to the side how he likes it. “Do you want to play nintendo?” he asks. 

The bathroom is small enough that Eddie’s shoulder brushes against Richie’s chest as he pushes past to unlock the door. 

Richie feels his spit in his mouth and he says “Yes, dude, obviously.” 

—-

Richie never really thought about what he was going to do after graduation. All he knew was that he wanted out. 

He wanted out in all senses of the word. 

Now that the day was here though, he found himself throwing up behind the school with Eddie’s hand on the back of his neck. 

“Something I ate, maybe,” Richie says and dry heaves again. 

“Yeah,” Eddie doesn’t mention the fact that they had the same thing for dinner the previous night at the Derry Diner. He also doesn’t mention that they both know Richie’s tendency to yartz when he’s scared. 

“We just gotta walk across the stage and we’re done,” Eddie says. 

“Stupid,” Richie says and stands up straight. He links his fingers and stretches his arms up pop his spine all the way down. Eddie looks extra short from here. 

“It’s more for our parents, Rich,” Eddie says. 

“My parents don’t give a shit, dude,” Richie counters. That’s probably not true, but as nice as his family is he also knows there’s distance that’s been shoved between them like a huge gay elephant in the room. 

“That’s not true,” Eddie says. 

Richie clicks his tongue and wants to crawl out of his own skin. He puts his forehead on Eddie’s shoulder and sighs. 

“Don’t barf on me,” Eddie says stiffly. 

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Richie’s voice is distant and soft and he only narrowly resists the urge to rub his face into Eddie’s graduation gown.

“We should just…” Richie feels his eyebrows knit together as he tries to ask Eddie platonically as possible to run away with him. “Leave,” he says. 

“Leave where?” Eddie says. Richie watches Eddie’s hands try to find pockets on the front of the gown, only to slip down the silk against his thighs. 

“Just leave,” Richie says. He pulls his face off of his friend’s shoulder and looks at him openly. “I don’t care dude, let’s just...skip.” 

“This isn’t class Richie, it’s gradu-fucking-ation.” 

“It’s not like they won’t let us graduate still. You just said it’s only for the parents. We can just play sick.” 

Eddie motions at the vomit on the pavement by their feet. “I mean, technically,” he says.

“Great! Then we should go!” Richie grins like it’s the best and dumbest idea he’s ever had. “This isn’t fun anyway, like what the fuck is the point. We’re wearing dresses and picking up pieces of paper? I could literally do this any time I wanted.” He makes a show of strutting in a circle around Eddie, bowing as he pretends to accept his diploma. 

“You do have a point,” Eddie starts to concede. 

“And, nothing would make your mom angrier,” Richie says with a sly grin. That’s usually a winning line when it comes to getting Eddie to do something stupid. 

“Another point,” Eddie says. “But then this summer is going to be a nightmare.” 

“Just stay at Stan’s,” Richie says. “Literally dude, fuck your mom. Not in the ha-ha fun way.” 

Eddie’s mouth wobbles like he’s going to protest and Richie gets it, like, it’s his _mom,_ but also it’s _Eddie._

The idea strikes Richie like a match. “We should go swimming,” he says. “At the quarry.” 

Eddie has a look in his eyes like nostalgia and Richie knows that he’s got him. They all go to the quarry all the time, but rarely, so extremely rarely, do they ever swim any more. The ceremony doesn’t start for another hour, and they will be long gone by the time they all get seated and see the empty metal folding chairs creating gaps in the alphabet. 

They duck between cars running across the parking lot to Richie’s bike where Eddie quickly climbs on the handlebars, feet looped comfortably around the pegs Richie has on the front tire. Richie stands while he pedals pushing off as fast as possible toward the backroad behind the school. 

Eddie’s cap is lifted from his head and gets carried off as the bike tips down the hill leading down to the woods. Richie’s cap only stays on because his mother insisted she pin it in place over his curls with her bobby pins. 

When Richie makes a sharp turn to the right instead of the left, Eddie slaps the handlebar and asks “Where are you going?” 

“Pit stop,” Richie says. 

“Pit stop where?” Eddie doesn’t like surprises and Richie knows it. But he doesn’t want to share just how delinquent he is intending to be this afternoon. 

Eddie has to hold on tighter while they go over the bumps of the dirt path down to the clubhouse. “This isn’t swimming, Richie,” his voice shakes when they hit a particularly rough patch. 

“It will be Eds, we will, I promise,” he says, an equally jittery tilt to his voice. 

Richie’s brakes haven’t worked for the past two years so he jams his sneaker into the dirt to stop and it sends them both careening to the mouth of the clubhouse. Eddie lands mostly gracefully, while Richie tucks and rolls in almost a full somersault. 

“Dick,” Eddie says, brushing off his gown. Richie pulls the cap off his head and drops it into the crushed and packed down leaves from last fall. 

Richie skips the ladder to jump straight into the cozy pit. Eddie pulls his gown up and tucks it into the front of his pants before climbing in. 

“God, this is still such a filthy hazard,” Eddie says with a wrinkle in his nose. Richie and Stan still come here often enough to get stoned after synagogue, and he suspects that Bev and Ben do the same when Bev comes up from Portland. Richie found that the losers stopped coming as frequently as they used to the older they got, especially Bill and Eddie. 

“What are you looking for?” Eddie leans against the only post that doesn’t precariously shift under body weight, probably muscle memory more than anything. 

“Something important,” Richie says. He pulls a Maxwell House coffee tin from a low shelf in the dark back corner. Eddie leans into the filthy darkness to watch Richie shuffle through shower caps to pull out three perfectly rolled joints, obviously crafted by Stan's careful hand.

"Not drugs too, Richie." Eddie sounds indignant. He's never been the most indulgent of the recreational grass but Richie thinks if they're going to skip their own graduation like slackers that they should smoke a bit too. 

" _Drugs,_ " Richie scoffs through his smirk. "Peer pressure works Eds, you should do it 'cause it's cool." 

Eddie stays quiet and Richie feels his eyes on him while he shuffles through the Losers' shit to find Ben's matches.

Richie whoops with excitement when he finds them and shuffles over to the faded and worn hammock with the joint between his teeth so he can strike his match while he goes. The inhale hits his lungs harder than he was ready for and immediately coughs it up, making the hammock swing under his weight.

"Smooth," Eddie says. 

"As a baby's bottom," Richie responds, joint bouncing with his words. He takes another drag and it still burns but he holds it appropriately before blowing the smoke in Eddie's face. 

Richie can sense Eddie's hands reaching for his inhaler and he says, "Sorry."

"You're not," he says over the rattle of the inhaler. He takes a puff of his own and still takes his seat next to Richie on the hammock, making it sway. Eddie keeps his dress shoes planted to keep them from tipping over.

Richie wordlessly offers the joint and Eddie just stares at it.

"No? Why, You got somewhere to be?" Richie asks. 

Eddie gestures to his graduation gown and says, "nowhere important." 

“Then here,” Richie can feel the first hit fuzzy on the bottom of his brain. He places it carefully between Eddie’s lips. 

Eddie awkwardly says thanks and Richie keeps his two fingers around it, waiting for Eddie to inhale. 

Usually he would yell at him and say he could do it himself but today Eddie just lets him, and he inhales, short and careful, almost the perfect opposite to Richie’s cocky drag. 

He lets out an equally short and careful cough after he holds it in his lungs for a second. 

Richie laughs and brings his hand back to his own mouth. He smiles through the next drag and stands up, swinging the hammock. He gives it back to Eddie and turns on the boombox from childhood, honestly surprised that the batteries still let it kick to life. 

Ben’s _New Kids_ CD starts playing and Eddie lets out a pleased howl of a laugh, equally ragging on Ben and enjoying the old tune. Richie watches Eddie confidently smoke because he thinks Richie isn’t looking. 

Richie only barely resists the urge to jump into the hammock, an act that would send them both ass over heads onto the dirt floor, he knows this intimately as he had done so many times before.

He takes another hit and takes off his gown. He rolls up the sleeves of his too-small dress shirt and undoes the buttons to expose an ugly Nirvana T-shirt underneath. 

“Cute,” Eddie says, looking over the shirt and all it’s holes and bleach stains. 

“Yeah you are,” Richie says back, and he’s bopping around to the staticky music. The CD is so worn and the boombox so old that it skips every time Richie taps his foot too close to it. 

They finish the joint and sit for a minute, letting the foggy softness settle over them. When the song ends Richie asks, “Ready to go swimming?” 

Eddie looks weird. Shy is the word that comes to mind, but Richie hasn’t ever seen Eddie shy before so he’s not sure. 

“Let’s go asshole, we would be there already if we didn’t stop.” 

It’s hard enough to ride a bike up the hill alone, but almost impossible with two bodies on it, so the two of them walk up the hill, Richie pushing the bike between them. 

“You shouldn’t get high and go swimming,” Eddie says. 

“We didn’t eat anything,” Richie says, carefully watching his feet. 

“That’s....” Eddie thinks for a moment. “That’s not the same issue,” he decides. 

“Huh,” Richie is still watching his feet and then they are back up on the road. 

“I want to pedal,” Eddie says. Before Richie has a chance to even think about swinging his leg over the seat, Eddie is seated happily. “You can sit on the handlebars this time.” 

“But it’s my bike,” Richie argues. “Besides, I’m too big for the handlebars.” 

“You are not,” Eddie counters and slaps Richies hands from the grips. “Get on,” he pats the handlebars and Richie starts to laugh, giggles bubbling up from his high and from the excitement of getting carted around. 

He slips and almost loses his balance, and Eddie yells at him. 

“This is hard, Eds how the fuck do you do this?” Richie tries to put his feet on the pegs how he knows Eddie does, but his legs are too long and it doesn’t make any sense. 

“It is not,” Eddie argues and pushes off, giving Richie no more time to figure out how to stay balanced. Richie slaps his hands over Eddie’s on the grips and holds on. Eddie wobbles a few times but once they get going, Richie stretches his legs out in front of him and cheers. 

“Graduation probably started,” Eddie says. 

“Yeah, well. Fuck it,” Richie hollers into the trees. 

“Fuck it!” Eddie howls louder. Their laughter carries and Richie feels like he could stay here with Eddie’s hands under his own for the rest of his life. 

“Oh, Stan’s gonna be so pissed,” Richie declares through his bursts of giggles. 

“Bill and Ben too,” Eddie says. “They’re all gonna be mad at us.” 

When it’s time to stop Richie just jumps off and tumbles, leaving Eddie to muck up his dress shoes by slamming them down to brake. 

Richie already has both of his shirts off and is working on his belt buckle by the time Eddie has undone his top button. 

“Come on, come on, Let’s go!” Richie sings. He drops his pants and sprints to the drop off, breezily leaping from the rocks without the hesitation of fear like the first and second, or third time he’d done it. 

He holds his glasses in place with his middle finger and the crash into the water hurts the same way it always does and for a brief moment he forgets which way is up. He swims until he finds the surface and when he does he sees Eddie is still at the top of the rocks, the sun behind him making him a shadowy blur through the watery mess on his glasses.

“Eddie!” He yells. “Ándale!” 

“I’m coming, asshole,” Eddie yells down. He watches Eddie slip off his shoes and Richie realizes that his own socks are still on. He can feel the wet cotton sticking as he wiggles his toes under water. 

When he looks back up he can see Eddie taking a few steps back to get a good running start. He watches his best friend leap from the rocks and pull his body up into a ball right before he hits the water. 

The splash is beautiful, but Richie is high and it’s Eddie’s splash so who knows. 

Richie sloppily treads water waiting for Eddie and races over when he sees him come up and spit out his mouth full of water. 

“I left my socks on,” Richie says when he reaches him, grinning like an idiot. 

Eddie lazily splashes him and says “that’s what you get for being in such a fucking hurry.” 

Richie reaches his toes out and touches Eddie’s leg underwater. Eddie shrieks and it doesn’t take long from there to start wrestling, playing one-on-one chicken and Richie finds that Eddie is still good at it, dunking his head underwater before he can barely get his hands on Eddie’s shoulders. 

They splash and race and argue until Richie feels like his limbs are going to fall off. He pulls himself out and lays on the big flat rock closest to the water. 

“Tired?” Eddie asks. 

Richie just mumbles his agreement and feels Eddie splash him before getting out himself.

“Do you think your mom has called the police yet?” Richie asks. 

“I’m not a missing person until 24 hours pass,” Eddie says casually. Richie feels Eddie’s fingers pull at the elastic of his socks and Richie narrowly resists the urge to kick him. He laughs instead, because it tickles. 

They stay there for a long time. Long enough where Richie feels like he might actually fall asleep, when he hears Stan’s voice from the top of the quarry. 

“Oh, you have to be kidding me,” he doesn’t yell but his voice carries the displeasure of his tone down the rocks well enough. 

“You guys are such a-assholes!” Bill’s voice follows shortly after. 

Richie laughs in a booming way that bounces off the trees. Bev’s voice is next but it comes from directly behind them, “Wow, dicks,” she says around the cigarette in her mouth. “I drive all the way up from Portland and you guys can’t even be bothered to go to the fucking thing.” Mike and Ben stand sheepishly behind her with shitty grins on their faces. 

“Give me one of those,” Richie says in lieu of apologizing. She sharply stares at him like he’s missing the point, but tosses the pack from her overalls pocket. 

“Your mom was going crazy,” Ben says and he sits down and pulls off his shoes to put in the water. "She grabbed Bill by the arm and demanded to know where you were."

“I bet,” Eddie says, but he doesn’t seem concerned. 

“What were you thinking?” Stan yells down again. 

"You're not my mom, Stanley!" Eddie yells, and he slips back into the water with a splash.

"Yeah well thank god for that," Stanley crosses his arms like he's irritated but Richie knows that he isn’t really. 

“Why don’t you come down here and we’ll tell you what we were thinking, Stan!” Richie’s voice carries up his shit-eating grin, and when Stan leaps from the rocks with his clothes on Richie’s laughter booms, disrupting the birds from their branches.

Eddie wolf whistles when Bill takes a second to pull his shirt off before jumping down as well. 

“How dare you skip without us,” Bill says, teeth chattering in the cold water.

“Even I was there,” Mike’s voice cuts through Richie’s laughter. “I don’t even go to school.” 

“Homeschool counts as school dick,” Eddie says. "Listen, we just didn't want to." He says it like it was his own idea and Richie’s throat feels funny so he coughs.

“We just didn’t want to,” Bev mocks with a pretty solid Eddie impersonation.

“Aw, fuck off,” Richie says. 

"You at least could have invited us," Stan says and he splashes Richie so his finally dry socks are soaked through again. 

“Well, you weren’t there when I asked,” Richie knows it’s not a good excuse, or even an excuse at all. 

“Of course we weren’t,” Stan says. Richie keeps his mouth shut as he watches Eddie smoothly and silently come up behind Stan and dunks his head underwater. 

"You're an asshole too," Stan spits a mouthful of water right in Eddie’s face..

Richie stubs out his cigarette on the rock and says, “well, we might as well have fun tonight while we can. We’re gonna be super fucking grounded.” 

“Oh, we’re absolutely fucked,” Eddie says it like it was worth it and Richie knows that it is. 

—

Richie’s punishment ends up surprisingly pretty tame. As it turns out when his father noticed one of the empty chairs was his, he found it a good enough excuse to leave and go home to watch the game. His mother said she wasn’t mad, that she was “just disappointed,” before claiming that she wouldn’t have to go through this with a daughter and that she would never understand boys. Blah, Blah, Richie has heard it all before. He was grounded with no nintendo for the week and he had to wash the car. Big deal, it was way fucking better than entire summer grounding that he’d been expecting.

Eddie’s mom was not as forgiving, but that was to be expected. She seemed more pissed that Eddie was with Richie than she was that he skipped his graduation. However, after giving him an absolute earful it seemed that she was so relieved that he was returned in one piece that she actually forgot to specify how long Eddie was grounded for. 

So Eddie gave it about a week and a half, before he left without bothering to ask. He went straight to Richie’s, where he was currently sitting on the floor, retelling how boring it was to watch television with his mom and how annoying it was to get inspected every morning like he was going to catch some kind of Richie induced disease, and how hard it was to not try to sneak time on the phone to call Richie just to talk to someone other than his mom.

Richie listened intently, watching Eddie mouth move as fast as he could run, barely taking pauses to check to see if Richie was even still listening. 

“Mike’s birthday is tomorrow,” Richie says suddenly, remembering that because of the very grounding that Eddie was mile-a-minute complaining about, he had no way of knowing that they were going camping tonight to celebrate. 

“Oh shit,” Eddie says, and it brings his aimless rambling to a halt. 

“How long do you think you can stay out?” Richie asks. “Can you get away overnight?”

“Depends on what I’m doing, I guess,” Eddie throws himself back onto the floor like a kid making snow angels. “But probably not.”

“Getting shit faced with Mike and burning shit in a huge pile in the woods.” 

“Oh. Well then of course, my mom will be down for that very safe and non-toxic, non-stressful environment.” He laughs and Richie can tell that it’s mostly at his own misfortune. “I’ll just tell her I’m at Bill’s. She likes Bill.”

“Cool,” Richie says with a grin. “Camping!” 

“Ugh, gross,” Eddie says, but he’s smiling too.

-

Getting shit faced and burning shit in a huge pile in the woods is exactly what they were doing when Richie and Eddie got there. 

Mike was sitting in an almost broken lawn chair, and it looks like Bill tied him in place with green streamers and dropped a carefully folded paper crown on his head. Bill’s feet were also firmly planted in Mike’s lap.

Three extremely small tents were already set up for them, because Ben is the best friend anyone could ask for. 

Stan seems to be a few drinks ahead and throwing marshmallows at Bev’s open mouth. 

“Fellow losers,” she says with a tip of her can. 

“Beverly,” Richie says, tipping his head towards her. 

“Sit down!” Bill laughs and throws a bottle at Richie’s face, Eddie snatches it before it connects with his glasses. “Catch up, boys.”

“Fuckin’ watch it, Bill,” Richie grabs a bottle of his own before Bill can try to kill him again and pops the top off with the lighter in his back pocket. Eddie wordlessly tips his bottle towards him and he pops his top off of his too. 

The fire is small right now, but they have stacks of schoolwork, boxes, and an endless supply of wood to get it raging. 

Eddie sits in the empty chair and it looks like there goes all of the free seating. Richie stands awkwardly for a moment and sips his beer. He sits in the dirt at Eddie’s feet. 

They know each other far too well to play anything like Drink If or This or That, it gets way too easy to gang up on each other. So instead they slip into conversation, pulling punches and giving each other shit for the same stunts they all pull. 

In no time at all Bill and Ben are waterfalling a drink into Mike’s open mouth and Richie is laughing so hard at Stan and Eddie wrestling that he feels like he’s going to throw up.

Bev slings her arm around Richie and asks him lowly how he’s doing. 

She knows. 

Not about Eddie, at least not explicitly, but she knows about the time in the arcade and she knows about Mrs. Kaspbrak, and she’s seen more graffiti about him in the girls’ room than the boys could even imagine. 

Kind of funny to think about now, given how much he remembers hating her and hating the rift he felt that she introduced to their tightly knit group of four. Seven now, and he loves her more than any other woman in his life. 

“I’m good,” Richie says, and he plucks her cigarette out of her mouth to smoke it himself. 

“Dick,” she says. 

“Yeah,” he says back. “So when is Ben moving to Portland?”

She sighs and lights a new cigarette from the pack tucked into her shirt pocket. “We’re not sure. Why you wanna come too?” 

Richie laughs. “Maybe,” he says. “I’ve got no plans at all. Leave. Work. Leave.” 

“Nothing wrong with that,” She says. She lays her head on his shoulder. “Are you sure you’re ok?”

Richie wonders why his friends are good at knowing when he’s not okay when he rarely ever knows it himself. 

“I’m tired,” he says. “That’s all.” 

“Aren’t we all.” 

Richie puts his hand through her hair and sighs. He wonders how the hell a person could want to leave a place so bad when all he really wants is to stay here with Eddie and keep wanting to leave. Even if that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. 

Maybe he will just close his eyes and throw a dart at a map and move there. He could call Eddie on the phone and maybe fall in love with someone else. But, god the thought of it makes him want to drown himself in Bev’s solo cup. 

But even worse is _telling_ Eddie. Fuck. Telling Eddie just how much he likes him and how much he thinks about him and how much he wants to kiss his hands or mouth or neck. Telling him and asking him to leave with him. The fear of it is crawling up his throat and it makes him think maybe he would prefer being in the basement of the Neibolt house. So yeah. 

He’s just tired. 

Bev kisses his head and gets up to make sure Mike isn’t too trashed, but he is. He’s a silly soft kind of trashed and Richie decides he needs to catch up. 

He grabs another for himself, and two more for Stan and Eddie. 

“Gents,” he says and pops the tops open for them. 

“Rich,” Stan says with a cheeky grin that only comes out when he’s been drinking. Eddie wordlessly accepts the bottle and his fingers touch Richie’s for just a second too long. 

Eddie, for all of his motor-mouth tendencies gets pretty quiet when he drinks. Richie thinks it’s weird and charming, but doesn’t he always. 

Richie reaches over and brushes dirt off of Eddie’s shorts and Eddie’s eyes follow the motion. Stan’s do too, and he grins a little harder and coughs a little laugh. 

Richie might kill him, if he doesn’t kill himself first. 

“What are you laughing at?” Eddie asks, and Richie feels even more embarrassed like he got caught doing something wrong and Eddie had to defend him. 

Stan just laughs a little more, and asks loudly if anyone wants to play cards, so they do.

After a few rounds Bill presents Mike with a paper plate of marshmallows, candles awkwardly stuck into them in lieu of a birthday cake. They sing loudly and badly and Mike tears up. 

“Happy Birthday Mikey!” Bill whoops and Bev hugs him and Stan swipes a few of the marshmallows from the plate. 

It’s getting cold and damp and Richie can feel himself and everyone subconsciously shift closer to the fire. Their tipsy chatter turns quiet and soft and emotional in a way that Richie is never ready for. 

Eddie talks about his mom and how she won’t pay for college unless he stays in Maine. 

Bev talks about moving somewhere warm, and Stan agrees. Bill talks about his acceptance to school for english and Ben is still waiting to hear back. Mike, to Richie’s absolute disgust, wants to stay in Derry. 

And Richie...doesn’t talk about anything, and that sort of tells them everything they need to know. 

When it’s time to go to bed the group of losers breaks into their usual packs - Richie and Eddie. Ben and Bev. Stan and Bill and Mike. 

Mike calls shotgun to sleeping in the middle and Richie laughs loud and abrupt at the absurdity of it. 

“No one wants to sleep in the middle!” Richie says. 

“I do,” Mike laughs too. “Stan and Bill both snuggle.” 

“We know,” Eddie, Bev, and Ben’s voices blend together in a tone that suggests they’ve all had personal experience. 

Eddie is not a snuggler, and Richie knows it. He’d hoped enough times at enough sleepovers for an awkward encounter that could be brushed off as an incident, an excuse to bury his face into his neck and breathe in the smell of his soap. 

Eddie sleeps like a freak, like he’s lying in a coffin and he wakes up every time Richie moves, so Richie tends keeps his distance.

They say their goodnights and crawl into their tents. Before they can zip up for the night Eddie asks Richie to spray him with more bug spray because he’s allergic to mosquitoes, which he’s not, but Richie does it anyway.

“Rich,” Eddie says while he curls up in the sleeping bag. 

Richie makes a noise in his throat that doesn’t entirely sound like “What?” 

“Where do you want to go?” 

Eddie never asks about the future because he knows Richie doesn’t like to think about it. 

Richie makes another noise that doesn’t entirely sound like “I don’t know.” 

Eddie rolls to his side and Richie mirrors him, his glasses digging uncomfortably into his nose but like hell he would take them off instead of looking at Eddie. 

Richie could feel Eddie’s leg between both layers of their respective sleeping bags and Richie desperately wished they were inside the same one. 

Eddie’s face tips just a bit and Richie feels like crying. He can feel his breath on his face and it was hot and sticky the way it feels when he would keep his head under the covers for too long. He wanted to lean away and breath in the cold night air as badly as he wanted to lean in and burn in hot, kind of wet hell. 

“I’m sorry,” Eddie says. 

“For what?” Richie asks. He can feel the pull of sleep at the back of his neck, the entire tent was spinning from the beer and vodka and beer in his stomach. 

Eddie’s nose touches his, and Eddie’s eyes close and Richie’s arms are trapped inside his sleeping bag cocoon and his body barrels into fight-or-flight. He wants to push the hair thats sticking with sweat to Eddie’s forehead back the way he likes it. 

“Eds,” Richie whispers. 

“Don’t call me that,” is the reflexive answer. His voice is just as quiet. 

“I’m really tired,” Richie says and he means it. He’s never felt so tired in his entire life. He’s tired like he’s caught doing something wrong again, and he’s tired of how badly he wants to tip his head and feel Eddie’s lips on his own. 

What the fuck, he’s so god damn tired.

“Me too,” Eddie says, and he stays on his side, with his nose touching Richie’s and his breath in Richie’s mouth. 

It would be easy to kiss him, but he doesn’t. He rolls over and falls asleep. 

-

“Richie,” Eddie says suddenly. Richie is currently sitting cross legged in front of the television in the basement. He’s carefully holding the VHS for _Terminator_ and reeling in the tape that the VCR tried to eat. 

“Hmm?” Richie doesn’t even look up from what he’s doing.

“Can I talk to you about something?” He sounds nervous and when Richie finally looks up from what he’s doing he can see that he’s peeling the label of his Coke into little ribbons. 

Concerned, but still distracted, trying to get the tape back in order he says “Sure man, always.” 

“Okay,” he says. 

Richie finishes reeling up the tape and Eddie still hasn’t said anything. When he looks up again, Eddie is kneeling right behind him. 

“Holy fuck, Eddie,” Richie jumps and cartoonishly scrambles to keep from dropping the tape. 

“Sorry,” Eddie says. “I didn’t mean to scare you.” 

“It’s fine just what the fuck dude,” Richie laughs and pops the tape back in. He eyes Eddie as he holds down the fast-forward, watching the Terminator in double time to get back to where they left off, where the tape had suddenly turned the picture sideways and then to static. 

“Richie,” Eddie says again. 

“Yeah?” Richie lets go of the button figuring he’s close enough and should turn his full attention on Eddie who seems to be a bit more unhinged than usual. 

He hardly registers what’s happening because before he knows it, he’s looking at the exposed pipes that make up the ceiling of his basement with the wind knocked out of him.

Ah. It seems Eddie had pushed him.  
Eddie’s big brown eyes are looking down at him, and Richie’s body feels every movement and shift of clothing and muscle as Eddie crawls over him and puts his knees on each side of him. So now he has an armful of Eddie and can’t quite figure out why. He feels his dick jump and he hopes that Eddie doesn’t.

What was he doing?

“Uh,” Richie manages to get out. 

“Richie,” Eddie says again.

“What’s uh,” Richie swallows really not sure what kind of ritual Eddie is putting him through right now. “What’s up?” his voice cracks. 

“You’re my best friend,” Eddie says. Richie knits his eyebrows together trying to figure out why he’s telling him that. He knows. 

Richie’s head barely starts to nod when he feels Eddie’s soft and kind of tacky lips against his. He must have put chapstick on just before and it makes Richie’s nose scrunch because he can taste the peppermint. 

Oh holy shit. 

Oh no, oh god.

Despite Richie never having any fucking idea what he was going to do with his life, he _had_ a plan. He knew that he loved Eddie and he knew that Eddie would not love him back. He knew that he was never ever going to tell Eddie just how much he liked him and he knew that he was never ever going to try to kiss him because Richie is just a big dumb _queer_ that would never find true love because no boy would ever compare to his best friend.

His best friend’s whose mouth was on his mouth. 

Richie hardly has time to kiss back when it stops and he feels his mouth chase Eddie’s as it leaves to connect again, which he does. 

Eddie freezes and Richie stops kissing him. Eddie looks like he’s about to cry and if he’s being honest with himself, Richie feels like he might look the same. 

“You’re my best friend,” Eddie says again just above a whisper. 

“Is that what you wanted to talk about?” Richie asks and his voice is strained. He’s not sure where to put his hands. They hover in the air awkwardly and he decides to just drop them, leaving his arms splayed out like the outline of a dead body in a cop drama. 

“I want to,” Eddie says and Richie is terrified to his bones that Eddie really is about to start crying. 

“Are you okay?” Richie asks. He wants to move, sort of, except that he probably wouldn’t for anything in the world.

“No,” Eddie says. 

“Not to sound like a dick,” Richie says and boy is that not as smooth of a start as he wanted. “But why did you just kiss me?” 

“Why?” Eddie echoes. 

“You did, just now right?” Richie can feel himself panicking. What if it was some kind of freak accident? Or a joke? “Did you want to again?” His mouth asks before his brain thinks. God, what the fuck? But what if Eddie says no? Eddie should probably say no. Since it was just a joke. Ha, Ha. 

“Do _you_ want to again?” Eddie echoes again. 

Eddie’s face is bright red and the blue of the tv screen is bouncing off his skin and Richie just keeps looking at him. 

“I-” Richie cuts himself off. He was so worried about Eddie feeling his dick in his jeans that he didn’t realize he can feel Eddie’s. 

"Fuck Eddie," Richie says. "Do you-" 

"I like you," Eddie says. "I like you too much Richie, I don't know what to do about it." 

"Too much?" Richie's words sound like they're misspelled. 

"Too much," Eddie says again. 

"No," Richie doesn’t know why he says it because he so badly wants to kiss Eddie again. Saying no probably isn’t the way to do that but hes scared and it feels like if Eddie gets off of him he’s going to wake up dead. 

When the door opens at the top of the basement Richie barely hears his mother call his name, and that Stan is on the phone.

"I have to go," Eddie says, and he jumps back like he just got electrocuted. Just like that, his weight is gone and he is pushing past Richie’s mom on the stairs. "Hi, Mrs. Tozier. Bye, Mrs. Tozier. Sorry, excuse me, I gotta go home,” his words come out like one massive one and Richie just stays laying on the floor listening to _Terminator._

“Thanks, Mom,” he says. She drops the cordless phone on his chest and tells him to mow the lawn before going anywhere. “Okay, Mom,” he says. 

“Richie?” Stan’s voice comes from the receiver. “Rich, I can hear you breathing.” 

He finally brings the phone to his ear and says as absolutely casually as possible, “Sorry Stan. What’s up?” 

-

It’s been three days and Eddie hasn’t talked to him at all. He’s too proud to cry about it, but god damn does he want to. 

So he hung out with Stan.

“So you’re hanging out with me a lot,” Stan says with his legs crossed neatly in the chair at the club house. “Did you do something to piss Eddie off?” 

“What’s Eddie got to do with it?” Richie snaps. 

“Yeah,” Stan says.

Richie immediately feels bad. He wants to ask Stan what he thinks about it, if he thought Eddie was just teasing him or if he did something to manipulate it. 

It just didn’t make any sense and Richie was stuck on the feeling of Eddie’s dick on his leg. Not just a fantasy this time either, a memory. A whole ass memory. 

“Rich,” Stan pulls him out of his thoughts for the third time this hour. “If you wanna go home you know, you could just say so.” 

“Sorry, Stan,” Richie scrubs at his eyes under his glasses. His face feels puffy like he might cry, but over his dead body was he going to. “A lot on my mind.” 

“We’re friends, man,” Stan says, and he slips his shoe mostly off and kicks it at Richie so that it hits his knee. 

“Ow,” Richie says lamely. He thinks that maybe he has been a bad influence on the other boy, who has gotten significantly rowdier through their teens together.

“You can talk to me about it if you want.” 

Richie blows a raspberry with his tongue. 

“Yeah well. Die then.” 

Richie really does feel bad. He doesn’t want to tell anyone but he deeply wants to tell someone and he doesn’t want to not tell Stan. He loves Stan. But he doesn’t know how to talk about it so he rolls over and crawls across the floor to just lean his head on Stan’s knee. 

“Are you afraid of anything?” Richie asks. He knows that he’s thinking about the time in the sewers, the time Stan’s raw voice cut through them all, _you’re not my friends._

“Some,” Stan says, putting his hand in Richie’s hair. “Why? What’s got you so afraid?” 

Richie stares at a knot in the wood of one of the precarious pillars. 

“I don’t like thinking about being without you all,” Stan says instead of waiting for the answer he knows isn’t coming. “I have a feeling that one day you will all be together without me and it will probably be for the best,” he says. 

Richie tips his head back to that he can look up into his friend’s eyes. Stan’s being honest and it hurts Richie more than anything.

“My life would never be better without you,” Richie says and he fucking means it. 

“Yeah well,” Stan looks away. “Yeah.” 

“I love you,” Richie says. 

“I love you too, Richie.” Stan smacks him rudely on the head. 

Richie doesn’t say anything for a long while and when he does the words feel like someone pulling dry cotton out of his throat. 

“I’m afraid of Eddie.”

Stan doesn’t say anything and Richie thinks that’s best. Stan is the best. 

“I’m tired and I’m scared, Stan.” 

Stan puts his socked foot on Richie’s thigh and taps him with it. 

“You guys are going to be okay,” he says and Richie thinks that he believes him. 

-

Eddie’s Mom is out of town. Eddie calls him on the phone to tell him so, five days after The Terminator Incident, and Eddie is telling him that he honest to god had to defend his right to not have a babysitter at age eighteen. He explains that it took over two hours to convince her to let him stay at Bill’s, but she finally caved.

“Every day that passes and every thing she says to me just makes me realize over and over how absolutely....” he trails off trying to figure out how to insult his mother and not feel bad about it. Richie listens. 

“So anyway you should come over,” he says instead, not at all intending on actually going to Bill’s. “It will be like we’re kids again.” 

“We still are kids,” Richie says, an echo of Eddie’s words from weeks before.

“You know what I mean, dick.” He does. 

The bike ride to Eddie’s house is one of the worst experiences of his life. He stops at one point, convinced he’s going to throw up. He stops again at the intersection deciding if he should really turn left to go to Eddie’s, because turning right would bring him to Stan’s and he thinks about how much easier that would be.

He would never let Eddie down.

He’s mentally preparing himself for Eddie to tell him that it’s all his fault somehow. A misunderstanding, that Richie is as horrible as he feels and he’s horrible for tricking Eddie somehow. 

_So anyway, you should come over._

_disease free. away from you._

_You guys are going to be okay._

He almost drops his bike on the front lawn but thinks better of it, scared that Mrs. Kaspbrak would somehow learn about his presence in her house, so instead he brings it around the back, and tucks it between the shed and the fence. 

He goes to enter the back door but finds it locked, so he knocks. He tries not to think about how alienating it is to have to knock when Eddie practically has a key to his house. It’s not on Eddie anyway. 

Eddie answers the door in what Richie thinks is one of Ben’s sweatshirts and his worst track shorts. By worst of course he means shortest. 

“Hey Eds,” Richie says and he feels awkward walking right in, so he waits for Eddie to step back into the kitchen before following him. Eddie looks like he wants to say something, but instead he just walks through the house to the stairs. They pass Mrs. K’s recliner and Richie feels the chill of her judgement. 

Richie fires off a few shitty jokes that Eddie laughs at as they climb the stairs. 

It is just Eddie after all. 

Eddie’s room looks exactly the same and completely different from the last time he saw it. It’s the same bed and the same desk but they’re in different spots. It’s meticulously clean and he has a huge stereo now that Richie remembers Eddie telling him about. His tapes are organized by color which is absolutely insane to Richie, but Richie’s are all in the wrong cases so who is he to judge. 

“Ta-da,” Eddie says lamely. 

“It sure is your room,” Richie says and he feels like a stranger, like he’s meeting his best friend for the first time, even though he used to be in this room at least three times a week until he was fourteen. 

Eddie pokes through his tapes and pulls one out. Richie watches Eddie turn and lean against the window sill, his shoulders bunching up to his ears from grabbing the edge. When he tips his head back to lean on the glass his throat is on display just as much as his thighs are.

Richie feels like all of his clothes are on backwards.

“Can I-” 

“We should-” 

They speak at the same time and stop at the same time. Richie watches Eddie and Eddie watches him and they both hesitate before trying to speak again. Richie can see Eddie’s adam’s apple dip when he clears his throat.

Compelled by curiosity and hormones and distracted by the sheer amount of skin that Eddie has, Richie hardly notices his muscles moving his dumb body across the floor and suddenly he can smell Eddie’s soap. He can also see a bead of sweat trail down his throat and tuck under his collar.

“Hi,” Richie says, and Eddie’s eyes drop to Richie’s mouth. 

Richie looks at Eddie’s mouth too, and wonders if it would be so bad to try to taste it again.

_Yes,_ his mind says.

Eddie wets his lips with his tongue and shifts his weight from one leg to the other. Richie wonders if Eddie put chapstick on before he got here like last time. Eddie’s arms drop from the window sill and Richie feels the fingers tug at the bottom of his shirt.

No, he thinks.

He can feel Eddie’s breath on his lips the same hot sticky feeling that makes him think of camping, and neither of them move.

“Richie?”

He feels like if Eddie blew hard enough he could knock him over.

Richie could feel his face go through a journey of expressions as he tried to think about it is he’s trying to get away with here and before long he tugs away, ashamed as always. 

“Eddie, I—” He drags a hand through his hair and then down his face, knocking his glasses crooked. “I didn’t mean to…” what? He didn’t mean to what? He doesn’t really know what to say, so he says nothing.

“It’s okay,” Eddie says. 

Is it though? 

“You’re my best friend,” Richie repeats Eddie’s words, the echo of what happened in the basement hanging between them. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to do anything just because I’m…” but he loses his words again. 

“Richie,” Eddie says, but Richie continues.

“I don’t want you to do anything that you don’t want to because you think that I might want to, you know? I think that if it was an accident or a joke you should tell me because I don’t care if it was and like, it was right? Because I’ve been thinking about it and nothing else really makes sense.”

“Richie,” Eddie says again. 

“You kissed me and that’s fine but I got scared cause you’re not supposed to like me and I’m not supposed to like you either and I was never going to tell you that I like you and then you did that and I’m telling you now, but it was all a misunderstanding, right? But if it was just kissing it would feel like an accident, but I could feel your dick on my leg and I’ve been thinking about that a lot too,” he says it all in a rush like if he doesn’t say it all now he will never have the chance to again. He says it all before the embarrassment can sink in. 

“Richard.” Eddie’s hands land on Richie’s shoulders and it screams _snap out of it._

Richie stops talking and now that Eddie has his attention it seems like he doesn’t know what to say. 

Fuck. 

“I—” Richie brings his gaze from Eddie’s hands, tangled in the hem of his shirt, to Eddie’s eyes. Eddie’s cheeks are splotchy and red, and Richie thinks his must look the same.

“It’s okay,” Eddie says. “It...wasn’t an accident. I didn’t know you liked me too.” 

Richie can tell he doesn’t look convinced because Eddie is looking at him like he’s an alien.

“I got scared too,” Eddie looks at the space between them on the carpet.

Richie stays quiet because he is afraid he’s going to mention one of their dicks again.

Eddie makes a noise, a sort of whine in the back of his throat that sounds like impatience. Impatience and wonder and worry. Richie can’t figure out what to do or what he wants to do.

Cautiously, Richie wraps his arms around Eddie’s middle and his knuckles make a loud thunk when they hit the glass behind them. When Eddie leans his head onto his shoulder he wants to eat his own socks. 

He thinks about dying.

“I don’t know why I did it,” Eddie says. “But it was on purpose.” 

The words sound like german. Or maybe dutch. But they can’t possibly be english because he doesn’t understand them.

He keeps his hands linked behind Eddie’s back and says, “This is really hard.” Eddie’s head lifts from his shoulder and he can see the dick joke light up in his eyes, it’s right there in front of them but neither of them can quite make it to the punchline. 

A bit too close to home this time, he thinks. 

“Can I try again?” Eddie says. 

“Try what again?” Richie asks. 

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Eddie says and he looks so fond that Richie is now certain that he is dreaming. 

Oh. 

“Oh,” he says. 

He thinks that it would be a romantic gesture to answer by leaning forward and kissing him, but he also thinks that he’s completely paralyzed so instead of just tipping closer the three short inches he says, “Yes, please.” 

For maybe the first time in his entire life, there are no words in Richie’s mouth. It’s probably because instead, he has Eddie’s tongue. 

“I…” he hums against Eddie’s mouth, and Eddie hums back. 

“I like this,” he says. Which isn’t what he meant to say, but it wasn’t wrong either. He meant to say “I like _you._ ” 

“Me too,” Eddie said. He sounded so fucking sure of it and Richie knew he meant it because Eddie didn’t have the time to lie.

Richie, on the other hand, had put so much of his time and his energy and his youth into lying and convincing himself just to convince others around him that he wasn’t exactly what he was. He lied over and over just so he could figure out how to move forward and not live the rest of his life in love with someone who would never want him. 

Another boy that would never want him. 

Eddie puts his hand to Richie’s chest and gently pushes so that Richie takes a step backward. Eddie takes a step forward and Richie steps back again.

Again.

And Again.

When Richie’s legs hit the bed behind him and he has no choice but to buckle down and sit on it. 

Being in Eddie’s room makes Richie feel like he is thirteen years old again. He feels thirteen in a way that makes him think of being dared to kiss his crush in front of everyone at a birthday party. 

At least it’s how he assumes it would have felt. No one had ever dared him to kiss Eddie before, but that’s what Eddie was doing now.

“You want to kiss me now?” Eddie asks. “Or should I keep kissing you?”

Holy fuck, he wanted to kiss Eddie and he wanted so badly to be kissed by Eddie. His brain spit and sputtered cocky jokes about being good at fucking but he can’t get his mouth to say any of them because he has no fucking idea what he’s doing and it’s not at all the same.

Eddie climbs onto his knees on the mattress next to him, and Richie drags his legs up, feeling stupid when he sits cross-legged across from him.

Richie can feel his nerves shaking his body and he slides himself forward. He feels Eddie’s knees bump his shins and he leans in, pressing his hands against the mattress on both sides of Eddie to keep his balance.

But now that his is inches from Eddie’s face he loses his courage and drops his forehead to Eddie’s shoulder, that shakes with a laugh. 

He can feel Eddie’s hand just above his elbow and Richie rubs his face into the soft spongey sweatshirt. 

“Sorry,” he croaks.

“S’alright,” Eddie’s voice sounds so amused that Richie wants to hit him.

“This is so fucking stupid,” he says. 

He only keeps his head in Eddie’s shoulder for a second, and then when he finally lets their lips touch again it feels wrong, too soft and not at all as cool as when Eddie did it. The bundle of nerves in his stomach knotted and told him that he was doing it wrong, that he was a fucking idiot. It wasn’t _enough_ , and his emotions were shaking wildly under his skin from the way-too-gentle touch. Richie could feel the tremble in his lip, and the air between them as they pulled apart too soon. 

He could still feel Eddie’s breath on his mouth, and he felt like an asshole, but Eddie just leaned back and and tipped his head just so, pressing his lips again to Richie’s pout. 

He let himself get pushed back into the pillows, Eddie crawling over him. The hungry way Eddie was kissing him now feels like how he thought it ought to. His mouth made him feel like he was drowning and on fire all at once.

Richie uncrosses his legs and stretches them out and when Eddie shifts and swings a leg over his lap for better leverage, Richie can’t help the sound that comes out of his throat. He can feel Eddie’s shitty cheeky grin against his mouth and lets Eddie kiss him again and again and again. 

Richie pulls away then, just enough to look at Eddie’s face, open and honest and nervous but not embarrassed. His eyebrows scrunch together, seemingly in annoyance that Richie stopped.

“Eds,” he says, and he is surprised at how different his voice sounds. How watery his eyes feel. 

“Richie,” Eddie’s legs are shaking on both sides of his own and he is certain it’s not because they don’t have the strength to stay up. 

“I’m sorry,” Richie says, not entirely sure what for. For stopping maybe, for taking so long to begin in the first place.

“You’re good at this,” Richie says then and it makes Eddie laugh. 

“No,” Eddie says. “But I think I like doing it.” 

All of Richie’s thoughts are pulverized into dust and he finds himself frantically and recklessly kissing Eddie’s mouth, and then his jaw, and then his throat. 

Eddie makes a noise and gently pulls Richie by his jaw back up to kiss his mouth again. 

When Eddie suddenly drops to his side, leg still haphazardly thrown over Richie’s hips and hands in his hair, Richie lets his knee nudge its way between Eddie’s. 

He pulls Eddie closer with his leg until their chests are pressed close and their faces are almost too close to keep kissing. He wasn’t trying to, but he can feel Eddie’s dick again on his thigh and he wants to sing a fucking song about it. Eddie would murder him if he tried. 

Eddie’s fingers touch his stomach then, and he feels like a bucket of ice has been dumped over his head. He jerks back nervously and stares at Eddie’s painfully honest face. Eddie’s hair is fucked up and laying across his forehead awkwardly. His lips are swollen and soft from kissing and Richie can’t stop looking at them. 

“When did you know?” he asks suddenly. 

Eddie doesn’t need to think about his answer he just says, “the day in the basement.” 

And isn’t that just like Eddie, to figure it out and immediately act on it. Richie is overwhelmed with intense jealousy and affection, so he kisses him about it. 

“When did you know?” Eddie asks cautiously. 

Richie doesn’t have a fast answer because he knows that he has always known it. 

“When you broke your arm,” Richie says, though he only just decided it to be true. 

“Which time?” Eddie has to ask, like he doesn’t know exactly which time. The ring of Richie’s voice yelling to look at him, the fear of It, and the weight of Eddie’s body in the basket of Mike’s bicycle sits heavily between them.

“Fuck,” Eddie says. 

“Sorry,” Richie says back. 

“What the fuck for?” 

“Not telling you,” Richie feels like he should be buried alive. Eddie just kisses him again. 

“I feel stupid,” Eddie says. 

“Me too.” 

“Will you kiss me again?” Eddie asks. Fuck how does he do that so god damn easily? 

“Yeah,” Richie says. 

When his shirt gets stuck on his glasses and Eddie has to help him get out he doesn’t even feel embarrassed. 

It’s just Eddie after all. 

-

It’s about an hour past the Derry curfew and the sun is just past down at the quarry. The rest of the losers are gone and just Richie and Eddie are left.

And isn’t it always.

“I love you,” Richie says and it feels so good every time he says it. He thinks he’s said it every single day since he figured out he was allowed to. 

Eddie just hums back. Richie is laying in the dirt and Eddie is laying on Richie’s jacket next to him. 

“You’re going to visit me a lot, right?” he asks. 

Eddie is going to school in Portland, close enough for Sonia and far enough for Eddie. 

Richie is also going to Portland, but the one that’s 3190 miles away. In Oregon.

Ben taught him how to drive, and he finally bought a car with all of his saved up money from mowing lawns and working at the ice cream stand in the summer. 

He’s finally leaving and it feels like shit. 

“I don’t know how many times I have to say yes to that,” Eddie says. He kicks at Richie’s shin. 

“I know,” but Richie still feels like shit about it. He kisses Eddie’s neck. 

“I’ll visit and you will call and I will call and we will see each other every chance we get,” Eddie says it like his ticking off an imaginary list. 

“Phone sex,” Richie says. 

“Don’t act so suave,” Eddie says. “Jackass.” 

Richie duly notes that Eddie did not say no to phone sex. 

“I don’t know why you’re so scared,” Eddie says, shifting to lay on his side. “It’s not like you’re going to move out of Derry and forget I ever existed.” 

“Yeah,” Richie says but he feels uneasy about it.

“We’re going to be okay,” Eddie’s voice is firm and honest and Richie knows that he believes it. It makes him believe it too.

_You guys are going to be okay._ Stan’s voice rings in Richie’s ears.

“We fucking better be,” he says.

**Author's Note:**

> stinkbrat on twitter


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